


Please, Promise Me Things You Can't

by InfaWrit10



Series: Sockathan Week (Week 4 Prompts) [5]
Category: Welcome to Hell - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, These two dorks met over Skype
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-22
Updated: 2016-07-22
Packaged: 2018-07-25 23:32:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,878
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7551406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InfaWrit10/pseuds/InfaWrit10
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Day 5:  Matching Outfits</p><p>(I really came out of left field with this one, in my opinion...)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Please, Promise Me Things You Can't

**Author's Note:**

> I had a different idea for this one too, yet this one was so strong in my mind, I had to write it, even when I'd started writing the other one. I also used the YouTube couple Samm Rochelle and Jeydon Wale as inspiration for the meeting scene, even though it wasn't like theirs, really. The specific video I used is called 'Just a few words...' If you wanna look it up. But seriously, they're both awesome, as individuals and as a couple, go check them out.

The bubbly music Skype made to signify a call emitted from his laptop. The one time Jonathan tried to be a good student, Sock called him. The boy always had a thing for timing, Jonathan noted; he was always near a device that could receive the call when he wanted to talk. Even when he came into his life originally was perfectly timed. The loner had begun to feel lonely, detached becoming desolated. And then he got a Skype call from a stranger.

Stranger Sock, as his nickname was for him now, became a daily escape after school from boredom and loneliness, and not just for him. Sock had confessed that he didn't have any friends and that he didn't really have anyone to really trust in his life quite early on in their friendship. It made the becoming-close-friends bit a lot easier, in Jonathan’s opinion. Both were willing to get closer, hitting it off immediately from the time they met to the present. Well, that’s a lie. Jonathan was a little hesitant on letting Sock into his life at first, what with his way of doing things being kind of irritating. His pros slowly outweighed his cons, though, and when he started to accept Sock’s flaws, he saw him in a bit of a different way. He started taking flirting more seriously, now answering Sock in a tone other than sarcastic—if he had answered him at all—when he normally hadn't. He saw Sock’s quirks as things that made him him, human, even adorable.

That’s when he realized he had a crush. It had been a challenge breaking down that barrier, but when the two finally—yet accidentally—confessed to each other one night at three o’clock in the morning, it had been a beautiful thing. Both nearly refused to say good night until Jonathan had to get ready for school.

That had been a year and a half ago, about, and Jonathan, now in college, faced the choice of either picking up or continuing his homework.

“Hey stranger,” Sock greeted sweetly. He always greeted him like that, creating a motif that ran from when they’d first met up until now. In addition to that, he always said ‘goodbye Jonathan’, personalizing it to just him, also a motif in the same way. Jonathan could see Sock’s legs kicking the air above his bed absently behind him in the background. Well, not his legs, more like too-long jeans flopping back and forth at a crease where Sock’s foot began.

“Hey stranger,” Jonathan smiled, seeing Sock’s face was always a joy. He noticed the clothing the other donned almost immediately. “Are those the clothes that I left at your place a few months ago?”

“Yep.” Sock said, getting on his knees to show off the gray hoodie. “I’m wearing your jeans, too. Hope that’s not weird.” He lifted the hoodie enough to see the denim sinking below Sock’s waist, showing a little more than the waistband of his briefs by accident. “Oh, shoot!” He hissed, pulling the hoodie over everything again.

Jonathan chuckled at Sock’s mistake, watching Sock scramble to gather his bearings. 

He sunk down, sitting on the back of his legs, eyes locked on a space off-camera, “…I’m gonna pretend I didn't just show you my briefs, thank you very much.” His tender lips curled into his mouth, coming back out once he realized he couldn't help but grin at Jonathan’s reaction.

Jonathan laughed outright with Sock’s comment, watching him firmly hold the hoodie down over himself like it would ride up. His hoodies didn't even ride up on him, let alone Sock, who was smaller than him.

“I’m gonna lay back down now,” Sock said, beginning to do so.

“You do that,” Jonathan threw the words into the air, winding down from his fit of laughter. The two waited until Sock was situated again before Jonathan picked the conversation back up, “So, why are you wearing my clothes?”

Sock curled into himself a little, shy, “I wear them when I really miss you…”

“What’s the difference between missing me and really missing me?” Jonathan asked, smirking.

“Well, I miss you all the time. Really missing you would be when my thoughts are literally nothing but you and I’m suffocating. I will continue to be suffocated by my own head until I call you, so… here were are. I really miss you.”

“How long d’you spend coming up with that one?”

“Not as much time as you’d take,” Sock countered, raising an eyebrow at the person who had underestimated him.

“Probably true…” Jonathan admitted, considering it.

Sock’s other eyebrow joined the other in a place of high altitude on his forehead, “Probably? Jonathan you could barely say ‘I love you’ the first time. Three little words.”

“Three little words that mean a lot,” Jonathan pointed out.

“Three little words that should say how you already feel about somebody…”

That sentence hung in the air for a minute while Jonathan thought of how to counter. “It’s tough to commit like that.”

“Excuse me?”

“No! No! That’s not what I meant—“

“Oh, here we go again.”

Jonathan groaned, falling back into his desk chair. He never had been good with words. He had told Sock that he couldn't write him sappy poems, that he couldn't do anything with words except recycle the ones he’d heard before. This triggered the first ‘I love you’, coming from Sock, daring Jonathan to say it back without saying it outright. Sock had looked up at him, gradually descending into laughter as Jonathan stumbled over his own mouth. He had apologized the moment before Jonathan had finally gotten it out.

“Jon?” the voice from his computer called. Jonathan opened an eye at the screen. “Jonathan?” Sock’s voice sounded coaxing, gently luring him out of his frustrated state.

“What?” Jonathan grumbled, opening the other eye.

“I’m just teasing you,” Sock smiled gently.

The silence that fell was peaceful. That didn't stop Jonathan from feeling like he should have said something, but had no idea what to say. He thought of a different topic, “I graduate in a few weeks…”

“Oh right, you’re going for a BA. Early congrats to you!”

“Thanks. I was thinking about it a few days ago, and…since you can’t afford a flight out here right now…” Jonathan brought his gaze to the keys below Sock’s face.

“Yeah…?”

“I was wondering if maybe you…would like to be Skyped so that you could see it too? The day of?”

“I’d love to.”

Jonathan sighed, relieved.

Sock noticed, “Wha’d you think I was gonna say, no?”

“No, no, it’s just… I’m happy to finally have asked you that.” Jonathan smiled genuinely, leaning back to swivel in his desk chair.

Sock had been meaning to ask Jonathan something too, but he was always scared that it was the wrong time, and he had a right to be. He was shot down when he indirectly asked it the first and only time they saw each other in person a few months ago.

////

Seven days. Jonathan would be spending seven days with him in person.

Sock had been counting down the days since the day they’d planned it a month back. Now, he was counting down the minutes.

He sat on a bench in the airport, uncaring of the other people who bypassed him, of how his boots stuck to the floor. All he cared about was that telltale mop of bleach-blonde animation hair.

He had spent twenty minutes scanning the crowd, his mind tricking him multiple times into thinking that he’d seen him. On the twenty-second minute, Sock spotted him, blinked. Yes, he spotted him. He stood up.

When Jonathan’s eyes were caught by the peripherals with a pop of color, he turned his head in Sock’s direction.

Sock shifted his weight from one foot to the other, giving a small wave through the thick crowd that amassed on that Sunday.

Once the traffic wasn't as bad, which only took a moment for some of the mass to clear the way, they began heading towards each other.

Sock bumped into a lot more people than Jonathan did, uttering excuse me’s and apologies nearly every step. They were distant, he was more focused on getting to the boy he’d been seeing yet never feeling. It felt like he’d been away for his entire life and was just now coming home, eager and welcomed. He finally got past the masses into a little area that was quite calm. Jonathan was waiting out of the way of busy people with busier schedules and busier whatever's. Sock didn't care if he was being polite, he just wanted to hold him.

He suddenly stopped, everything coming to a screeching halt.

Sock looked him up and down. It was the first time he was seeing his entire body without an obstructed view. It was his hoodie, the one he always caught him wearing. He noticed his baby blues were brighter in person, that he was taller than he’d imagined him.

It looked like Jonathan was going through the same thing, running his eyes along every part of him just to take in that this was real, that he was here. Jonathan noticed just how many shades brighter Sock’s green eyes shone when he was in person rather than through the screen. He could also make out the peppered freckles across his nose and cheeks that hadn't come up on camera.

They met each other’s eyes, grinning.

Sock flung himself at the boy, relishing the weight, the feel, the scent of Jonathan. He hugged him as close to him as he thought possible. The feel of Jonathan’s arms snaking around him was enough to make him further bury himself in the younger’s body.

Jonathan towered over Sock, but he hunched over so that he could get as close to Sock as physically possible. He took in everything, breathed him in, touched him, entrapped himself in him.

Nothing stayed absolutely still. Their feet stumbled when too much weight was straining them, their arms readjusted to a slightly different position every few seconds, their heads nudged and nuzzled every now and then. They couldn't care less.

…They stayed that way for a long time.

Sock was released, taking it as a cue to release Jonathan as well. Neither released the other fully, like they were pinching themselves by touching the other person to make sure they weren't dreaming.

“H-hey stranger…” Sock’s voice was small, finding courage to tug his gaze to the other’s eyes.

“Hey…” Jonathan chuckled, unsure why, but he did.

Sock released Jonathan’s forearm to trace the lines of his face and brush the blonde bangs from his eyes, “You’re cuter in person…” he giggled, embarrassed.

“You are too.” Both laughed harder.

“What’s so funny?” Sock wondered aloud, even though he knew it was because they were ridiculously happy.

“I have no idea.” Jonathan knew now, too.

Their laughter began to fade into the crowd, some prying eyes watching the exchange with mixed emotions.

Sock suggested, “So… Shall we head home?”

////

Sock laid across Jonathan’s lap, content as the blonde felt him trace the lines in his face again. Jonathan sensed a pattern, his lips were traced more than the rest. Sock hooked his pointer around Jonathan’s lower lip, smirking. “What are you doing?” Jonathan questioned as best as he could with his lower lip practically useless.

Sock giggled, “I’m trying to convince myself that this is who I’ve been talking to for over a year, that you’re not some stranger, but I’m not processing it yet.” Sock released Jonathan’s lip when he politely pushed Sock’s hand away from his face.

“Yeah… It takes a bit to sink in.”

Sock froze, thinking of something. He sat up, face inches from Jonathan’s with his legs curled on the couch beside them. “Let me ask you something…”

“Sure.”

“You were straight before… What does it feel like to be with a guy now?”

The question hit Jonathan upside the head. He didn't know. He and Sock hadn’t even kissed yet, so he had no idea what the difference was to have a physical connection to anyone, even Sock. He answered honestly, “I… I don't know…”

The breath from each other added heat to their cheeks, turning them red before Sock leaned in to peck the lips he traced earlier.

Jonathan blinked. That was nothing. Nothing and everything. He wanted more, yet that felt so infinite, like he could last a lifetime just with that fluttering feeling it gave him in his chest. It was left on his lips, a tingling sensation that didn't stop as long as he looked at him.

He pulled him in again. And again. And again. And again.

////

It was the end of the week.

The boys were hopelessly entangled in the bedsheets. Jonathan had a hell of a time getting out to pack.

Sock whined when he left.

Jonathan threw his gaze over shoulder to a pouting Sock. He rolled his eyes and got back up on the bed, pushing Sock’s hair from his face.

“Stay,” Sock breathed, grabbing Jonathan’s wrist to keep his hand in place as he moved his head into the touch.

“I can’t… I—“

“Have to finish school. I know that, and I would hate to try and convince you to just give up on that, but… This isn't fair. You only just got here. I’ve seen you seven days out of almost a year and a half. Seven days is not enough, nothing will ever be enough. My eyes are tired, Jon. My eyes are tired from looking at a screen all the time. I want to give them a break and look at a real person for once, sleep beside a real person and not the laptop I always use as a pillow. I want you.”

Jonathan changed from apathetic to empathetic immediately, feeling the same way, but waiting to voice it. “Sock…” was all he said, planting a kiss on Sock’s forehead and another one on his temple.

“I love you,” Sock said, voice breaking as if he were about to cry, although it was just a half-asleep tone from a sad person.

“I love you, too,” Jon strode across the room to his backpack, before he turned and threw his hoodie at Sock’s face and his jeans toward to foot of the bed. “Keep ‘em.”

“What? Are you serious?” Sock clutched the gray cloth, hopeful.

“Yeah. If I wear these,” Jonathan held up a pair of sweatpants that he’d taken from his bag, “nobody will think twice. Normal people like to be comfortable in an airport, and jeans aren't necessarily the most comfortable things to wear…”

“But what about the hoodie? Can’t you like,” Sock cleared his throat a few times before sticking up air quotes and saying in a deep voice, ‘not bear to part with it’?”

“Yeah yeah, I have two more just like it at home. Consider that one yours. You can like… I dunno, use it to be less lonely or something. That is, if you think they’ll help.”

“Definitely, yeah. I mean, maybe they will… I don't know. I have a feeling they will,” Sock stumbled through the sentence. He sighed, recovering from how messy his response had been. “Thank you, Jonathan.”

“Anything.” He meant it as ‘anything for you’ but it came out as just ‘anything’. Again, this boy is not good with words.

Sock got what he meant regardless. Jonathan strode back over to Sock, engulfing him in a tight hug. They stayed like that for however long it was before Jon said that he had to go, or else he’d miss his flight.

“Hey…” Sock called to Jon on his way out.

“Yeah?”

“There’s a key…on the hook near the door… It’s a spare one…” It took him another minute to get the next words out, “Take it.” He paused, “Can you please lock up on your way out?”

Jonathan paused, knowing what that meant from the lack of expression on where the key went after he was done. He could slide it under the door, or he could leave with it. Sock was leaving it up to him. Although, from his little speech, it was safe to say that he’d want him to take it. He wanted to too, but he just couldn't stay while he was still in school. He nodded.

After a prolonged, heart-wrenching goodbye, Sock got on top of his blankets, waiting for Jonathan’s heat to leave him. It took him five minutes to put on the hoodie, and quickly fall back asleep.

////

Sock bit his lip now, recalling that moment where he’d asked him to lock up.

“Hey, Sock?”

“Yeah?” His stomach twisted, was Jon gonna ask him about why he suddenly looked anxious?

“You know… I’ve been lookin’ at the key you gave me for this entire conversation almost, and maybe… maybe when I’m done with my schooling… We could…” Jonathan found the words difficult, but it was too late to back down from them now, ever since he said ‘key’. He had waited long enough, and he burst out, “move in together?”

Sock face lit up entirely, grin displacing any negative emotion.

“Okay!”

**Author's Note:**

> I listened to 'Missing You' while writing this. I was **this** close to using it as the title, haha. Also, sorry if the end seemed a bit rushed, I wasn't feeling that well so I kinda wanted it to just be done with. I'm okay now though! So that's good at least, and I'm happy with how it turned out so... Win-win?


End file.
